Embedded Linux Targets Telecom Infrastructure

Reach out and...Tux someone! Rick reveals the many ways Linux is entering the telecom market.

The 22-member nonprofit Open Source
Development Lab (OSDL) used the occasion of LinuxWorld 2002 in New
York to announce a major new Linux initiative aimed at the
telecommunications infrastructure market. OSDL has created the
Carrier Grade Linux working group that is chartered to provide
“vision and guidance” and to “encourage the development of
whatever commercial and open-standard components are needed on top
of Linux to implement required platform functionality” for the
telecommunications industry. The Carrier Grade Linux working group
is made up of some heavy hitters in the telecom market, including
Alcatel, Cisco, HP, IBM, Intel and Nokia. Linux vendors MontaVista
Software, Red Hat and SuSE are also members of the working
group.

OSDL has articulated several reasons why the
telecommunications industry needs a new standards-based,
carrier-grade operating system platform, and why Linux is ideal to
serve as its basis:

Networks are converging for multimedia
communication services.

More bandwidth and new architectures are
needed.

Open-standards-based, off-the-shelf software
components are needed to improve time-to-market of new
services.

An open-standards-based approach reduces
development cost/risk of products for the new architectures.

Fragmentation of the Linux kernel must be avoided
for both data center and communications market segments.

The group's initial focus is to collect market requirements
and specify the architecture for a Carrier Grade Linux platform
(see Figure 1) and also to encourage development of third-party
components on top of Linux that implement the required
functionality of the platform.

Other indications of the march of Linux into the telecom
market are seen in the following recent headlines:

HP: “Linux Is the OS of the
Future in Telecom”: Also this year at LinuxWorld in New
York, HP unveiled a range of new Linux-based products and services
targeting the internet infrastructure, telecommunications and
network equipment provider markets. They include a family of
Linux-based, carrier-grade servers and a developer's kit for HP
Opencall software. The new telecom-oriented server family will be
powered by Carrier Grade Linux, when available. According to Mark
Butler, HP operations manager for telecom systems operations, HP is
strongly supporting Linux as the OS of choice for the telecom
market. “Linux is the operating system of the future in the
telecom sector”, Butler said. “HP is leading the advance of Linux
in the telecom market.”

Motorola Targets “6NINES”
with New HA Linux Platform: Motorola Computer Group also
is promoting Linux into telecom infrastructure. They recently
announced the latest version of their telecom-market Linux
platform, HA Linux 3.0, which Motorola claims implements
“significant steps toward providing the key operating system
features required for 6NINES-availability, or the equivalent of 30
seconds or less of downtime annually”. Motorola says to achieve
that level of uptime, you need properly designed hardware, not just
the right software; Motorola provides HA Linux as an OS for its
carrier-grade CompactPCI systems.

Nokia Unveils Linux-Based
Platforms for All-IP Mobility Networks: At the 3GSM
World Congress in Cannes, France, Nokia announced a new Linux-based
platform technology for what is being called “All-IP” mobility
networks. The first products based on the new All-IP technology are
to be Nokia's open, carrier-grade FlexiServer and FlexiGateway
platforms. In January 2002, MontaVista Software announced that they
had been chosen by Nokia Networks to help develop Nokia's All-IP
infrastructure.

Linus Says “kyllä” to Preemptible Kernel
Patch!

The preemptible Linux kernel patch, originally introduced by
MontaVista Software and more recently championed by Robert Love,
has now been officially merged into the main Linux
development-kernel tree, starting with kernel version v2.5.4-pre6
[see Rick's interview with Love in the April 2002 issue of
LJ].

Although this enhancement came about as a means to provide
faster responsiveness of Linux for industrial and embedded control
applications, the benefits will be, in the words of Love:

...a means to an overall better system. Besides
the traditional markets for low latency—audio/video, specialized
embedded/real time, etc.—a preemptive kernel can benefit any
interactive task. The result is hopefully a smoother, more
responsive desktop.

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